Four days ago I received a message from the App Store stating that I could upgrade my iPad to iOS 5.1.1. I immediately jumped on this chance and decided to carry out the upgrade. I connected to iTunes to start the upgrade. After going through the dialog boxes, the upgrade began. It started off well, but then the progress bar froze. I waited 3 hours but it was still frozen in the exact same position. I closed iTunes, but when trying to upgrade it again, I received the same dialog boxes and the same problem concerning the progress bar. Closing iTunes again, I walked over to my iPad, but all I got on the screen was a message telling me to connect the iPad to iTunes (the same message that appears when you switch on the iPad for the first time). I decided to hold down the power button. After holding down the power button, the Apple logo appeared briefly, and then the screen flashed back to the message telling me to connect the iPad to iTunes. After trying yet again and failing to get it to switch on, I decided to give in and connect it to iTunes. I left it there, and then turned it on, but the same screen yet again flashed up.

Can anyone help me complete the upgrade and get my iPad to switch on successfully?

-------------------I'm considering returning here sometime in the near future. If I do, DO NOT make any remarks about my past life and/or that I'm gonna start making stupid "castlewars threads" because that's over with. Let it go, for once.

How far in was it when it failed to upgrade, Castlewars? Half way? Almost complete? It could be possible that you will have to connect the iPad to iTunes again and do a full restore on it for it to be able to boot up again. You can also try to use some of the tools to kick it out of recovery mode(eg TinyUmbrella) before doing a factory restore.

-------------------I'm considering returning here sometime in the near future. If I do, DO NOT make any remarks about my past life and/or that I'm gonna start making stupid "castlewars threads" because that's over with. Let it go, for once.

Try using TinyUmbrella to kick the iPad out of recovery mode, if that doesn't work you will have to do a factory restore if you don't have the option to click on Restore within iTunes, Castlewars. Hopefully you did a backup before starting the upgrade.

Try using TinyUmbrella to kick the iPad out of recovery mode, if that doesn't work you will have to do a factory restore if you don't have the option to click on Restore within iTunes, Castlewars.

Do you have to download TU from the App Store on the iPad? Because I can't get it to switch on.

-------------------I'm considering returning here sometime in the near future. If I do, DO NOT make any remarks about my past life and/or that I'm gonna start making stupid "castlewars threads" because that's over with. Let it go, for once.

No, you can download TinyUmbrella from here they have a Windows / OSX Version. There are various tools within that site that can assist you with recovery issues.

I'll just see what my brother can do with it. If he can't fix it, then I'll download it.

-------------------I'm considering returning here sometime in the near future. If I do, DO NOT make any remarks about my past life and/or that I'm gonna start making stupid "castlewars threads" because that's over with. Let it go, for once.

Castlewars;Try to download the firmware from somewhere else. GetiOS is a great website. It has all the firmware IPSW's you can think of. Just look the one for your iPad (I would give you a direct link, but I don't know if you have a 3G + WiFi model or just a WiFi model).After that, turn the iPad on again until it asks you to connect it to the computer. When it does, it will tell you you need to restore in order to use it (or at least it's very likely it will ask you that), so Shift + Click (or Option + Click, if you are using a Mac) the "Restore" button. Shift/Option clicking will bring a file dialog that you can use to browse for the IPSW file you downloaded.